You do not currently have permission to view the full text for this document. Please sign in to an account with an active subscription or contact support.
In 1976, Charles Sarnoff wrote an exhaustive volume on latency, in which he discussed latency from multiple points of view. He ultimately defined his own viewpoint, namely, that latency is a stage in life between ages six and twelve when the healthy Western child achieves a "state of latency." That is to say, the child achieves a state of relative calm, pliability, and educability. Sarnoff indicated that this state is made possible by what he called the "structure of latency." This is an ego mode that allows the defensive use of fantasy, which permits thinking to become a substitution for action. The Freudian notion that latency is ushered in by the resolution of the oedipus complex and the formation of the superego, leading to repression of sexuality, is seen as old-fashioned and largely out of date in our society today. In this sense, latency is seen primarily as a product of the culture in which the child grows. Certainly, there is little attempt today to separate the sexes during the school years or to support repression of sexuality. As Sarnoff points out, those children who do not achieve this "state of latency" have difficulties in school, behaviorally and academically. They fail to achieve the